The OCD Games

by Kayla Krantz

  A lot of times, I wonder why she’s put up with me for all the years that she has when it would be so much easier for her to walk away and pretend she never knew me.

  “I don’t expect you to understand,” I say at last.

  “Good, because I don’t,” she says bitterly

  I shrug in response. I’ve definitely been told worse.

  7.

  THE FIGHT WITH Kara is so stupid, so passive, and yet, I still don’t talk to her for the rest of the day. She drops me off at home with a less than stellar goodbye, and I trudge inside, staring at my muddy shoes. This time, I take them off on the rubber mat, staring at my rainbow painting on the wall. I hate it today and consider tearing it down, tossing it right out into the snow to rot, but I know that without it, the wall will look too bare.

  I strip off my clothes, not even bothering to put on pajamas. I crawl into bed in just my underclothes and clutch my pillow, letting it soak up the tears that find their way free every few minutes. After our argument, my self-hatred is unnaturally strong ,and I wish I could fall asleep just to have a couple of hours where I won’t have to think about it. Instead, I lay in the darkness of my room, phone beside my head.

  I pick it up and squint against the light as I read the screen. There’s no messages, but I hadn’t expected there to be. With a groan, I toss my phone to the floor and get up. I go to the bathroom and pull out my bottle of sleeping pills from the cabinet. I stare at the bottle for a long moment with a sigh. If there’s one thing I hate, it’s taking these. It’s not natural, but every once in a while, like today, I find that I have no other choice. I pop one of the pills into my mouth and swallow it down along with all of my reservations. As soon as my head hits the pillow, I’m asleep.

  WHEN MY EYES open again a few hours later, I feel hungover. Clamping my hand over my mouth, I rush to the toilet and throw up a mouthful of stomach acid. Grimacing at the taste, I move to the sink and rinse my mouth out with three handfuls of water. I stare at my reflection, finding no humor in it today, and decide that just washing my face isn’t going to cut it today. I jump into the shower and scrub my skin until its red and raw. As I climb out, I wrap a towel around myself and frown. Usually, I feel renewed after a good shower, but the surge of emotions from yesterday is still there, just as strong as the day before that, and the day before that. I’m eventually going to have to come to terms with the fact that it’s just a new addition to my routine.

  Feeling upside down about my job, my friend, and myself, I throw on one of my old outfits, finding it too difficult to put on one that Kara picked out, and make a pot of coffee, tapping my nail eagerly on the counter. I want to believe that today will bring me something good, but I can’t imagine what. I drink three cups of coffee, despite my brain warning me that that might not be the best idea but somehow, I’m still tired. It’s like I have a leak in my skin where all my energy seeps away just as soon as I create it.

  I drive exceptionally slow, still feeling the aftereffects of the sleeping pill. The only remarkable thing about my hangover is that I don’t stew in my car, thinking about my anxiety. Instead, I climb out of the car, and when I finally make it inside, I see Blaine is at the first register. My eyes catch his before I even realize he’s what I’m seeing.

  “Hi!” he calls cheerfully, looking up from counting the money in his drawer.

  I stutter a pathetic, “Hello” in response as I shuffle past to get my own till for the opposite register. I count out the money in triple sets of threes just to make sure it’s right. My head is pounding so badly that I would believe two plus three equals six. When I get the money counted, I shuffle over to my register and get that prepped as well. I look around, expecting to see Camilla’s bright blonde hair at any moment, but I don’t see it.

  It must be her day off.

  Me and Blaine, alone. I swallow roughly and glance at him from the corner of my eye, but he’s engaged in a conversation with an elderly woman, and thankfully, he doesn’t notice. I try not to focus on that thought. I take a sip off my water bottle then work on pulling a few customers out of Blaine’s line. I throw myself into my job today, trying to not let my headache shut me down completely.

  As I count out a customer’s change, I see him looking at me from the corner of my eye. He’s trying to talk to you, and all you care about are some lighters? I can nearly hear Kara’s singsong scolding in my head.

  I think about tearing a chunk of my hair out just to have something else to think about. Thankfully, Mondays prove to be busier than Sundays had been. When a break in customers comes, I actually dread it, ringing up my last customer in line as slowly as I can manage because I know that once I’m alone with my thoughts, they’ll torture me all over again. I watch my hands work but from the corner of my eye, I still see him.

  Blaine wipes down the belt on his register before glancing around his side of the store and sauntering over to me. “Just you and me today?” he asks, leaning his arms on the divider to peer down at me.

  My heart beats in my chest as I finish counting out the customer’s change. “Uh-huh,” I reply, hoping my face isn’t as red as I imagine it to be.

  He smiles and leans down a bit. That’s when I realize his gaze is trained on my open drawer. “So, it’s been you…you’re the one leaving the immaculate drawers in their wake?”

  I duck my head to hide the blush and look at the offending item in question. “Guilty as charged.”

  He leans closer to me, so close that I can smell his spearmint gum, and I just stare at his lips, imagining what it would be like to kiss him. Time seems to freeze as we stand there, looking at one another.

  “I do the same,” he admits at last.

  I perk up at the confession and close my drawer to pass the lady her money. “Yeah?”

  He nods and wipes at the corner of his mouth. “Yeah.” He chuckles. “I also have to make sure they all face the same way when I give someone back their change.”

  “Really?”

  He nods and pulls his face tight. “Wait. You’re not going to laugh?”

  My brows furrow instantly. “Why would I laugh?” I ask, trying not to think again of the way he had laughed at me.

  “Camilla did…the first time she noticed me doing that.”

  “She said you were strange,” I tell him.

  He laughs and reaches up to scratch the back of his neck. “That’s one word for it, I suppose. My doctor calls it obsessive compulsive disorder.”

  I turn toward him, staring at him with such a mix of emotions that I wonder if I’ve lost the rest of my mind. He’s…like me? Is it possible the chuckle from the other day hadn’t come from malice but understanding like some kind of inside joke that only people with compulsions get? This development makes things so much more interesting. The thing I hide the most about myself now seems to be my ticket for starting a conversation with Blaine.

  But how?

  “A lot of people don’t understand,” he says, smile dropping off his face and just like that, he seems like someone else—vulnerable even. “That’s why I tend to keep to myself.”

  There’s a statement I can relate to, I think, remembering back to my conversation with Kara. “They really don’t.”

  The smile returns on his face, a ghost of its former self, before he pats the divider with each hand. “Customer,” he says apologetically and goes back to his own register to help them.

  “Talk to you later,” I call after him, surprising myself with the sentence.

  The rest of the day seems to go in that fashion. We say a line or two every few hours, working hard for the time in between. With about an hour left until the end of my shift, the crowd dies down, and we’re left to clean up the front of the store. There are chips and magazines tilted and tossed everywhere, and my compulsions are twisting so deeply inside of me that I fear I might throw up despite my hangover having worn off hours ago.

  Blaine goes to work around his register, straightening the bags of chips on the tiny aisl
e by him. For me, the chips are easy to ignore. It’s the lighters that draw my attention. They’ve been left in such a disorganized fashion that I can’t even think of them without picking at my skin for a distraction.

  With a strangled sound climbing up my throat, I push myself onward and knock all of them off of the display. Scattered on the floor, they make me uneasy as well, but it’s better than the feeling they left me with a moment ago. I crouch down onto my knees and one-by-one, I put them back in the perfect order. My chest swells in pride when it’s done, and the little voice inside congratulates me on a job well done.

  I turn my attention to helping Blaine with the chips. He smiles at me when the sound of my sneakers squeaking on the floor announces my arrival.

  “Come to help?” he asks.

  “If you need my help.”

  “Of course. You take this shelf, and I’ll work on the one over here,” he decides.

  I agree, and he moves to his aisle as I stare at the portion of chips I’ve been assigned, trying to find the best way to go about my newest task at hand. Chips are easier to organize than the lighters had been, and when I’ve finished, I move to head back to my register. Then I stop, a cold chill creeping down my spine when my eyes catch sight of the lighter display, and I cringe—they’re flipped around in the opposite direction of the way that they need to be.

  I huff and rush over to them, hearing a blast of laughter from farther down the aisle, the same laughter that had made me crumple in on myself the other day. I turn to see Blaine with a huge smile on his face, laughter pouring from his mouth, and suddenly my brain figures out what just happened—he’s playing with me. That’s what he had done the first time too, right? He never meant to hurt my feelings.

  You are a very silly girl, I think to myself coldly. How could I have misjudged him so severely?

  “You moved them!” I accuse, eyes stretched wide as I move them into the exact same pattern I had done ten minutes prior.

  “Oh, why oh why, can’t your brain be wired the same way as mine? It’s like we’re competing in the OCD games or something,” Blaine jokes, walking over to me with his arms folded over his chest.

  I’m not used to hearing the abbreviation out loud. Usually, Destiny and the other members of support group shorten it to ‘compulsions’ or on a good day, urges. They never say the term as if they think denial is the first step to recovery, though I have to admit that I hate the name of it too.

  “You’re determined!” he tacks on, studying my profile.

  I laugh, and as the sound comes from my lips, I realize how natural it feels. It’s so nice to laugh. “They say women know best,” I reply, lifting my chin to eye him as soon as the last lighter is in place. Crush or no crush, my brain does not like his method of organization, and briefly, I consider super gluing the lighters just to keep him from moving them again.

  I hear the muffled sound of his voice as he says something to me, but I can’t focus on him like a normal girl could. God, when did I become jealous of Kara?

  He lifts his hand, and it draws my attention. I narrow my eyes, assuming he’s about to mess up all of my hard work once again, but he doesn’t. He holds both hands up, palms out and says, “You win.”

  “Good,” I beam, chin held out as I go to work organizing the first rack of magazines by the register.

  Blaine follows me, hands in his pockets, and my heart skips a beat, wondering if he’s got something to tell me. And what it is if he does? “So, are the lighters and the magazines your only quirks?”

  I pause—not what I had expected, but interesting all the same. I don’t answer right away, and he doesn’t move. It’s like the entire scene has been captured with a freeze frame moment like ‘80’s shows do to give the main character a chance to talk to the audience. The only problem here? I have no audience to bounce my ideas off of. However I answer him is my choice, and mine alone.

  You should be honest, comes the moral part of my personality, and I want to obey but telling the truth to anyone outside of support group is something I’ve never tried before. Technically, he did ask. “I-I do things in threes,” I say at last. He raises an eyebrow, and I take that as a sign to continue. “I wash my hands three times, I put my clothing on three times over, I lock the door three times before leaving the house…that kind of thing.”

  Blaine nods as if that makes perfect sense, and I have to wonder that if it does in his compulsively wired brain. “Mine isn’t numerical. I-I’m a bit more complicated than that.”

  “How so?” I ask, genuinely interested to know.

  He looks away, and I study his profile, the way his lips curl downward into a slight frown like he’s having his own freeze-frame moment. The longer the moment drags out, the weirder it begins to feel. He might not share in the affliction at all—a lot of people make jokes about little things being OCD when they’re nowhere near the same level as me. I deflate a bit at the thought. If something seems too good to be true, it usually is.

  Or maybe he really does have it, and this moment is just as difficult for him as it had been for me. Blaine breathes in through his teeth and takes a step closer. We’re so close now that our chests nearly touch, his nametag brushes my apron when he lifts a hand to wipe at his mouth, and I ignore the flutter in my heart caused by our proximity. I focus on his chocolate brown eyes with the intensity of everything hanging in the air.

  “You won’t think I’m weird?” he asks, face drawn tight as if this is an impossible thing he’s asking for.

  I shake my head and his face is right next to mine, his closeness making it difficult to remember how to breathe. “Promise?” he asks, setting his hand on mine.

  “Promise.” My dry throat cracks at the gesture. The touch of his skin sends electricity buzzing through me, so strong that I almost forgot the point of the promise in the first place. I might as well be a drone—I’ve lost all control over myself at this point anyway.

  He pulls his hand away and picks at the edge of his apron as if he’s suddenly too shy to make eye contact. “Mine works in checks.”

  “Checks?” I ask, tilting my head.

  He pulls his lips tight, looking away as if doesn’t know how to explain himself. “I have a number of things that have to be perfect before I can leave the house or go to bed or do anything really.”

  I blink but don’t interrupt as he pulls his words together. I’ve heard of cases like his before, some of them from support group—his is the most severe form of OCD that I’ve heard of. Thankfully, I’ve never experienced it myself.

  “If everything’s not perfect, I have to start over with the routine from the beginning. Sometimes, it gets to the point where I spend hours just trying to get it right because I miss sleep and can’t focus,” he says, hanging his head as if he’s ashamed to admit that.

  The look on his face is full of pure shame, and I realize something—he’s just confided in me something that he’s ashamed of. Something that he most likely doesn’t tell a lot of people. When I see that look on his face, I want to reach out and pull him into a hug but can’t bring myself to do it.

  “Have you ever talked to someone about it?” I ask him, hoping my tone doesn’t come off as disinterested. The thought of him going to support group with me creeps into my mind, and I’m not sure what to do with the image it conjures.

  His eyes move from the floor to meet mine. “I’ve never been to a therapist. Too embarrassing.”

  My heart thumps for a different reason than my hormones, and I realize that I’m sad for him. The prison of my own mind is the worst pain I face, and seeing others in the same position hurts me too.

  With shaking fingers, I work up the courage to set my hand on his shoulder. He peers at me through the strands of his black hair as I say, “Don’t be embarrassed! It’s not as if people like us choose our quirks. I’ve never been ashamed of mine, and I know that’s partly due to my mother’s support and my friends from support group. It’s good to be around people who understand.”
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  “Ugh, support group,” he says and lifts his hand to shield his eyes as if he’s avoiding looking at something unpleasant.

  “Have you ever gone to one?” I ask and pull my hand away, wondering if I’ve just found a way to make him feel even worse.

  He nods and looks across the store, a blank expression on his face. “Once but…it wasn’t for me.” He swipes his tongue across his teeth. “It really helps you?”

  I shrug. “In a way. Knowing I have an outlet, other people who understand me, lifts most of the weight off of my shoulders. It’s kind of what AA is to alcoholics, I guess.”

  Blaine bobs his head and snickers at the analogy before he looks away sharply, pretending to survey for customers even though the bell chime of the door hasn’t gone off for a good thirty minutes. He’s avoiding eye contact at this point, and I don’t blame him.

  I’m glad for his choice in gestures.

  “I visit my group once a week. It used to be three times a week, but after my mother died, I started to depend less on others and focus more on myself. I have a website that I go to for advice and helpful exercises that push me through the harder days when I don’t go to group. They’re great stress relievers,” I say.

  “What’s the name of it? I might check it out.”

  It should’ve come to me instantly, but as I stare up into his ungodly perfect face, I draw a blank. “I-I can’t remember,” I say at last.

  Blake blinks. “Oh okay.”

  I want to hit myself when I hear the tone of his voice—the last thing I want is for him to think I’m lying.

  The bell above the door dings as a group of teenagers comes in and Blaine eyes them though I can’t tell if it’s with unease or gratitude. He looks back at me and says, “Well, I’ll tell you what. Add me online or something, and if you think of it, send me the link, and while you’re at it, give me the information for your support group too.”